


Just like he always does

by Bumblie_Bee



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Drug Use, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Todd to the rescue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:22:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27579088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bumblie_Bee/pseuds/Bumblie_Bee
Summary: Most of the time, Todd wouldn’t give up his life as the best assisfriend of a slightly psychic detective with his own investigatory agency for anything. It’s incomparable to his old life of lies and poorly paid work and monotonous days and angry landlords and has left him so much happier and healthier and better as a person. It has given him friends and a purpose and a new family.Then there are the odd moments, the one in a million, where Todd would rather his life wasn’t quite as exciting as it is.This is one of those moments, and not even for his sake.In which Dirk gets into trouble and Todd comes to his rescue.
Relationships: Todd Brotzman & Dirk Gently
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	Just like he always does

**Author's Note:**

> This was written back in April 2018, it just took me a while to finish it off! 
> 
> Please let me know if you spot any glaring typos, and as always, comments are loved :)

Most of the time, Todd wouldn’t give up his life as the best assisfriend of a slightly psychic detective with his own investigatory agency for anything. It’s incomparable to his old life of lies and poorly paid work and monotonous days and angry landlords and has left him so much happier and healthier and better as a person. It has given him friends and a purpose and a new family.

Then there are the odd moments, the one in a million, where Todd would rather his life wasn’t quite as exciting as it is.

This is one of those moments, and not even for his sake.

It’s two minutes to midnight on a cold Tuesday evening when Todd finds himself frowning up at what could very easily be a haunted house. It’s old and large and in the middle of nowhere, miles out of the city and sat beside a still, dark lake that’s situated at the end of an overgrown road so pothole riddled he isn’t sure his spine or suspension are ever going to recover.

The house doesn’t appear to be in any better condition than its driveway, with overgrown hedges licking up at the broken and grimy glass of the downstairs windows and the once impressive front door now warped and tired, with flaking blue paint and the knocker hanging wonky. The walls and the roof of the house look uncared for and worn, the bricks cracked and blackened and clinging with ivy and tiles cracked and missing in places, leaving darkened holes amongst the moss covered red of the rest of the roof.

Todd frowns uneasily up at the house. It doesn’t look an inviting building, and it certainly isn’t the sort of place he’d choose to drive to so late at night especially with the weather so bitter, but Dirk, or Dirk’s phone anyway, is inside according to it’s GPS, and so that is where Todd needs to be too. Feeling brave with worry and urgency, he locks his car, lights the flashlight on his phone, and then starts confidently forward.

Despite his intense desire to run blindly into the house in search of Dirk, it’s been hours since Todd received a text from him so badly typed that he had trouble deciphering the actual wording of his cry for help and even longer since he went missing, he enters the house cautiously. The front door opens surprisingly quietly for wood and hinges so old and uncared for, and once the door is open, Todd realises the house isn’t quite as abandoned as it had first appeared. Inside is currently is as dark as outside, the pitch black seen through the windows no illusion, but it clearly isn’t always as there is a generator, yellow and new and with a red flashing error light, sat in the corner of the hallway.

The house is silent, no noise from people to match the currently quiet generator, but Todd doesn’t take that to mean it’s either empty or safe. For a moment he pauses, searching for a plan, and then, after thinking of nothing better to do, he cautiously follows one of the three blue wires snaking out of the generator in hope of finding someone who might lead him to Dirk, or better yet, Dirk himself.

The wire leads him to what he assumes used to be the kitchen; the remnants of counter tops and cupboards still line the walls of the room and a broken gas stove sits in the far corner beside the grimy window. Despite the layer of dust and rotten wood settled over the surfaces, the room has clearly been recently used, the floor scuffed with shoe prints and a line of modern heating mantels covering the old oak table in the middle of the room. That’s what the electricity supply is for. Well, that and the well worn coffee machine sitting beside a stack of mugs and beans in the corner of the room. Despite being at home in a kitchen, it looks oddly out of place.

Todd doesn’t know what the room is currently being used for, but judging by the assortment of flasks and beakers and various other pieces of glass that he hasn’t seen since high school chemistry classes, he doesn’t think it’s making cakes. Hell, he doesn’t even think they’re cooking drugs in here, not any sort he’s seen before anyway. It looks a fairly sophisticated setup, the state of the house considering, and Todd finds himself suddenly very worried as to what his friend has stumbled upon.

Despite the darkness, it very quickly it becomes apparent that Dirk isn’t in the kitchen and calling his name softly into the darkness of a walk-in larder receives no reply either.

Hurrying across the hallway, Todd finds the only other downstairs room with power turns out to be in a somewhat similar state to the first, in that what had at one point been a family sized dining table has since been converted to a make shift laboratory bench, the varnished surface since bleached with chemicals and darkened with burns. Todd doesn’t linger long, half because there is no Dirk Gently in the room, and half because of the acrid stench that seems to be coming from a smoking, bubbling flask abandoned on a cooling heating plate on the far corner of the table.

Back in the hallway, Todd briefly considers searching two other downstairs rooms, but they are likely unpowered judging by the lack of blue wires trailing through their doorways, and he has a feeling that upstairs, wherever that third lead is trailing, is probably a more likely location for Dirk to be.

The stairs are old and dusty and the first three all creak as he climbs them, but the wood still seems structurally sound so he hurries quietly up the rest of the steps, arriving on the landing with his breath held in his throat and his heart pounding, both longing for and dreading the arrival of another person.

He waits, and the seconds tick by and no one arrives.

Exhaling shakily, he starts towards the door at the far end of the landing.

The door to the room is already open, caught ajar on the blue cabling traveling inside, and when Todd gently pushes it open and flashes his light around the room, his stomach does a funny little flip because there are bodies, seven of them, just lying on the dusty hardwood floor, and although bodies aren’t a rarity in his life any more, they are a sight he will never get used to seeing.

In the centre of the room, in the middle of the ring of bodies, is a machine. It’s toweringly tall and obviously handmade, with a large cage surrounded by wires and cables and screens. The main wire, the blue one Todd had followed into the room, looks to have been pulled from a socket at the base of the machine and is now laying in a large puddle that covers most of the floor. The men, the bodies, are all in the puddle too, and Todd has a theory that might explain both the death of the men and the flashing error light on the generator downstairs.

But what Todd’s eyes are drawn to more than the machine or the bodies or the massive puddle, is a flash of yellow, bright and warm and almost out of place in the bleak and grimy room. The yellow, a jacket, he realises, is on the other side of the room to the door, just past the machine and the puddle and the bodies, and is being worn by a man who is slumped between the thick curtains covering the filthy windows in the front wall of the house. Heart throbbing in his chest, Todd shines the light towards the obnoxious jacket and the apparently unconscious auburn-haired man wearing it.

Despite his lack of consciousness, Dirk is sitting upright, his slumped form propped against the wall with his long legs stretched out in front of him and his sharp chin drooping down against his chest. In the dim light, a weeping scratch on his cheek is just about visible, the blood smeared across the sharp bone and onto the bridge of his nose and the pale skin beneath it already darkening. It looks as though he’s been punched, and knowing Dirk, he probably has.

“Dirk!” Todd stumbles on something small and light and roughly cylindrical in his haste to cross the room, sending it skittering away across the floor. The item, whatever it is, hits the wall beside Dirk with a light clatter. Todd ignores it, his attention elsewhere, and stumbles on towards the limp form of his friend.

Dirk looks up, apparently woken by the sound of his name, or maybe by the sound of Todd’s footsteps on the oak floorboards as he tried to catch his balance, his eyes glassy and unfocused. He blinks heavily, light brown brows furrowing, and then his head lolls on his shoulder and falls back to rest against the crumbling wall behind him with a dull thud.

Although it must have hurt, he doesn’t react to his head hitting the wall, and his dark eyes roam the room, finally, finally resting on Todd just as he falls to his knees beside his friend. A satisfied sort of smile, one that’s sluggish and sloppy but very much there despite the situation, settles on his lips as he murmurs something too low and long for Todd to understand.

Todd doesn’t smile, not even when he realises that it might have been his name Dirk slurred contentedly.

“Dirk, what’s wrong?” he asks instead, his tone urgent and a little shaky. Usually Dirk would tell him nothing’s wrong, insist he’s fine even when he isn’t, even when he’s dizzy from a concussion or bleeding out from a stab wound or nursing a broken wrist, but this time Dirk’s eyes drift closed again and he lets out a noise that sounds suspiciously close to a snore.

His expression slackens entirely, the sluggish, inappropriately satisfied smile sliding off lips that fall open just a little in his unconsciousness. In the quiet of the room, the soft breaths whistling through them are audible even over the panicked heartbeat pounding in Todd’s ears.

“Oh, come on, Dirk, wake up!” Todd says, begs, taking hold of Dirks shoulder and giving it a gentle shake when his words achieve nothing. The shake works, and blue eyes flutter open, roaming unfocusedly again as Todd’s scour the limp form in front of him for signs of injury. Dirk’s dishevelled, his hair a mess and his shirt rumpled and untucked, and his jacket is ripped along the shoulder seam as though someone had grabbed him by it. There’s blood on his face, smears over his nose from the scratch on his bruising cheek along a little more smudged up by his hairline, and blood on the front of his pale blue shirt, too, the stains almost black in the dim lighting, but there’s not enough to be worrying in itself. Not enough to indicate a stab wound anyway.

Where it’s come from becomes obvious when Todd reaches up and runs his hand through Dirk’s hair to check for bumps or bleeding, because although he finds nothing concerning lurking beneath the soft brown locks, the protesting hand that arrives to bat his away with an irritated keen is darkened and tacky and leaves a red smear on Todd’s pale skin.

Instinctively he catches hold of it, taking it gently and frowning as he pulls it into the soft beam of his flashlight in search of the source of the bleeding. Dirk whines again, the noise urgent and a little distressed, and tries to pull himself free, but Todd’s grip tightens and his pulse races as he stares at the sluggishly bleeding ragged puncture wound marring the rapidly bruising skin on the back of Dirks right hand.

Todd’s heart thunders in his throat and he suddenly feels very sick.

The hand it his gets tugged free moments later. He’s much to weak with fear to fight it.

“Dirk, what did they give you?” he demands shakily, aghast, the words a horrified whisper.

Dirk seems either not to hear him or not to care. With his hand now free and laying limp on the floor beside his thigh, he’s relaxed again, and his head lolls from side to side against the wall as his eyes wander the darkened room, his gaze neither focusing nor halting.

Todd, terrified, grabs him by the shoulders and gives him another shake. Dirk’s head hits the wall this time, his skull colliding against the crumbling plasterboard with another thud, but it does the trick and his gaze lethargically returns from the room. Eventually, he focuses back on Todd.

In the dim light, Todd finally notices that his pupils are dilated to the extent that the blue of his irises is gone, leaving an eerie blackness in their place. He almost shudders.

“Dirk, listen to me, it’s important! Do you know what they gave you?”

This time Dirk appears to hear him, and he blinks and his eyebrows furrow, and then slowly, his pink lips stretch into a wide grin.

“Todd,” he says, slurs, happily, and then tries to lift his head from the wall. He gets it upright, but then it lolls violently towards one shoulder, his neck like rubber, and his body slumps sideways too, pulled over by the dead weight of his skull. Todd catches him before his hits the dusty floorboards and hauls him upright by the shoulders, propping him back against the wall. Dirk seems unfazed.

“Why’re you here?” he asks curiously, his tongue sliding uncoordinatedly over the syllables.

“Because I’m the idiot who decided to always be there for a self-sacrificial slightly psychic nutter who can’t stay out of trouble even in the middle of the night,” Todd sighs under his breath, not quite meaning it but also, well, he’d prefer it if he didn’t need to keep rescuing Dirk from such situations, and more for Dirk’s sake than his. The man has 99 lives and the universe on his side, but Todd is secretly terrified that one day Dirk’s luck is going to run out and it won’t be an ambulance he gets taken away in.

Dirk’s head lolls to the side, his neck muscles giving out again, but his eyes stay focused and his brows furrow as though he’s actually trying to process what Todd has said.

Then he giggles.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, you crazy man, Todd,” he slurs around his amusement. His right arm lifts and makes an uncoordinated attempt at patting Todd’s shoulder. Todd catches it as it makes a path towards his nose, sighing only half in frustration, and then inspects the sluggishly bleeding wound and the bruising on the back of it again. Dirk doesn’t fight this time, his expression relaxed and trusting, so when he’s done, he switches his grip, his fingers finding the soft spot on the inside of Dirk’s wrist as he had done with Amanda countless times before. The pulse beating below his fingertips is slow, almost alarmingly so, but it’s steady and strong and Todd relaxes a little.

“Dirk, look at me,” he says, gently, tapping the hand held in his.

Dirk doesn’t react; he’s busy watching the blood running down his arm over the bruising fingerprints left on his wrist and soaking into the pale blue sleeve of his shirt with hypnotic interest. Todd gives the hand a squeeze, frowning when Dirk still doesn’t respond.

“Listen Dirk, this is important!” Dirk does look up from the arm at that, and his eyes finally focus back on Todd’s, the almost black iris’ holding lethargically to pale blue. Todd smiles. “That’s it. Now, focus; do you know what they gave you?”

Dirk, to his credit, seems to focus this time, and his eyebrows knit together in concentration. Then his head bobs uncoordinatedly in what Todd assumes to be a nod.

“Drugs. They…” he trails off, seemingly unable to find the word, but his right hand pulls from Todd’s grip, the first two fingers curing and stretching as if pushing a syringe. Then he frowns. “It hurt. Then-” he shakes his head, his eyes widening fearfully in a way that would have been comical if not for the situation.

“It’s okay, you’re doing great,” Todd sooths gently, giving him a smile. “Do you know what sort of drugs?”

Dirk nods at that, his black eyes like saucers as they drift over to settle past Todd on the cage like contraption in the middle of the room. “For the machine.” The word is badly whispered, the syllables drawn out and slurred, but it’s clear Dirk thinks he’s giving important information. Maybe he is, but Todd doesn’t care all that much about whatever insane scheme Dirk has stumbled upon this time, he just wants to know that his friend will be okay.

“Do you know what the drugs were for? Or why they gave them to you?”

Dirk frowns and shakes his head again, but his eyes have lost their focus. They roam the room briefly, and then he closes them and flops head back against the wall. It thuds again, and Todd grimaces at the headache he’s sure to have whenever he comes back down from his high.

“‘m Sleepy, Todd, ‘s all floaty and cosy.” He sighs contentedly, and then smiles, his eyes still closed. “‘s like a cotton wool bath.”

Todd sighs too.

“I’m not sure you’ll like whatever it is they gave you quite so much tomorrow,” he mutters, and then sits back on his haunches, not entirely sure what to do. He knows there are only two options really, because he could either take Dirk home and hope that whatever it was that is that has been so roughly injected into his hand isn’t dangerous, or take him to the hospital, and just hope that there wouldn’t be too many questions about how he had ended up in such a state. Todd looks to his friend, head fighting heart, although even he isn’t really sure which way round they are arguing.

Dirk is still and quiet and appears to have fallen back asleep still slumped against the wall. He doesn’t seem in any danger currently, just incredibly lethargic in a way that makes Todd think whatever had been given to him was probably some form of sedative. What exactly it was though, and how much of it he’s been give, Todd has no idea, but he knows for sure where would be better for Dirk to sleep it off if that’s all he needs to do. Still a little torn, Todd leans forwards and shakes Dirk awake again by the arm. Dirk’s eyes flutter slowly open, large pupils finally resting on Todd.

“Hey, Todd,” he slurs, smiling dopily. The expression holds for a moment, and then his eyes drift off towards the room, and for the first time he seems to be actually looking at what he sees. His eyebrows knit together in confusion. “Are they bodies?”

Todd ignores the question.

“Listen, Dirk, if I take you home, you’re not going to die on me, are you?”

Blinking heavily, Dirk frowns in confusion. “Why would I do that, Todd?” he asks, rolling his head against the wall. “‘t wouldn’t be ideal.”

Todd rolls his eyes.

“You’re not having any hunches telling you to go to the hospital?” Dirk’s eyebrows knit together curiously. “No impending sense of doom?”

Dirk’s frown deepens, and he blinks and then shakes his head. “What’s…” He trails off, briefly looking around again with just as little urgency but maybe a little more awareness than earlier before the settle back. “Todd?”

Todd’s heart aches a little at the trust and relief and confusion and the beginnings or worry packed into the four short letters of his drowsily whined name. He isn’t sure if it’s that that settles their destination or not.

“Come on, stand up, let’s get you home,” he sighs, pushing himself to his feet and pulling Dirk up by his arm. In spite of his confusion, Dirk does make some effort to cooperate, but his legs are useless and his balance is entirely off and Todd has to sling the arm around his shoulders just to keep him upright. Dirk’s head ends up rested on his shoulder despite the hight difference.

“Where’re we going?” he slurs, blinking dazedly.

“Home.”

Dirk sighs appreciatively into his neck and mumbles something incoherent. He closes his eyes and Todd pinches his side.

“Come on, Dirk, at least try to walk,” he groans as he starts the slow stumble in the direction of the doorway. Dirk sighs again, but cooperates, sliding one shaking foot in front of the other.

The make it a grand total of three steps, Dirk shuffling uncoordinatedly and Todd stumbling under the added weight, before Dirk stops again. 

“‘s all spinning,” he mutters, the words slurring into one, and then giggles lightly.

“I know, but please, Dirk, come on, just keep walking,” Todd groans and gives the arm slung around his shoulders an encouraging tug. Dirk hums against his neck and then, without warning, slumps towards the ground as his legs give way beneath him. Todd tightens the grasp on his wrist, stumbling under the suddenly added weight and hauls him back upright with a grunt. It’s a minor miracle that they don’t both end up back on the floor.

After a second, Dirk’s legs seem to catch onto what’s happening and he makes an effort to stand. He mutters something Todd doesn’t catch but does start towards the doorway again when he gets a tug on his arm and another gently spoken encouragement.

“You look worried,” Dirk remarks two steps later. Todd rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, well, I’m still not sure how far you are from overdosed.”

Dirk pauses to consider this, but then sighs dramatically. “I’m not sleeping, Todd, I’m as awake as a bean.”

“Are beans capable of being awake?” Todd asks as he gives the arm in his another tug towards the door, amusement mixing with worry in his tone. “Besides, it’s overdosed, not over dozed.”

Dirk hums thoughtfully.

“Like too much drugs?”

Todd looks towards him, surprised at his understanding. He’s surprised again by Dirk’s expression; he’d been expecting him to look worried or confused by the concept, but instead he’s looking curious and fairly focused for his current state.

“Yeah, exactly.”

Dirk nods, and then tiredly rests his head back onto Todd’s shoulder, his soft hair resting against his chin.

“You shouldn’t worry, Todd, I’m fine,” he says, slurring, despite his declaration. Todd smiles half-heartedly. 

“Yeah, I know, you’re prefect.”

Dirk nods against his shoulder.

“Exactly, so, you need to chillax, Todd,” he says knowledgably, raising a limp hand in an attempt to point at the grimy ceiling. Then he giggles. “I like that word, chillax, chillax, chillaaax.”

“Where did you even learn that?” Todd asks. Dirk rolls his head, trying to look at him, but his muscle control has gone again, and it tips to his other shoulder, throwing what little remains of his balance. Todd stumbles, his back protesting as he catches Dirk just before he falls.

“Chillax,” Dirk chuckles, oblivious, and hums thoughtfully.

“Dirk, stand up,” Todd groans, his voice tight under the strain of Dirk’s almost dead weight. He pulls again on the arm still around his shoulders.

Dirk blinks and then his head lolls back onto Todd’s shoulder and he attempts to straighten his legs beneath him.

“That’s it, there you go,” Todd mutters, encouragingly, as he restarts their slow stumble towards the hallway beyond the door. Dirk stays silent, his head again resting on Todd’s shoulder, and a look of concentration on his face as he focuses on the mammoth task of putting one foot in front of the other. He’s walking better than before though, so the concentration must be helping.

Dirk’s focus fades as soon as they make it out of the door and onto the landing and he lifts his head, trying to get a better look of his surroundings. It isn’t long before his neck muscles give way again and his head falls back onto Todd’s shoulder.

“My head’s too big?” he asks, sounding worried, just as they reach the top of the stairs.

“Don’t worry, it’ll be back to normal when you come down from that high,” Todd mutters distractedly as he eyes the staircase. Walking with Dirk down the stairs seems like an accident waiting to happen, but he’s too heavy to carry and Todd isn’t sure what other option they have.

“Listen, Dirk, you’re going to have to concentrate, we just need to get down the stairs, okay?”

Dirk’s head rolls on his shoulder and he looks down, his unfocused black eyes meeting the worried gaze of his friend. He blinks, then frowns.

Todd sighs. “Did you hear any of that?”

Dirk purses his lips thoughtfully and then shakes his head. Todd exhales forcefully.

“I didn’t think so. Just concentrate on the steps, okay?”

Dirk nods this time and then sets his eyes on the stair case.

“One step, two step, three step,” he mumbles to himself, and Todd rolls his eyes and starts the slow decent of the staircase.

Dirk seems to focus for the first few steps despite his rambled, off step, counting, and his legs take more of his weight than they had before. On the fourth step from the top, he stops, blinking hazily down at the rest of the stairs. Todd tugs at his arm, but Dirk rolls his head against his shoulder in protest.

“I’m tired, Todd,” he sighs sleepily, and then without another word, his legs give way entirely, sending him slipping through Todd’s grasp and tumbling head first down the remainder of the staircase. He lands in a crumpled heap of yellow jacket and pineapple print tie at the bottom.

For a second, time stops, and Todd is frozen three quarters of the way up the staircase, his eyes fixed on the unmoving form of his friend. He’s landed almost upside down, his head and shoulders on the floor and his legs sprawling up the stairs. He’s facing up towards the ceiling too, having rotated at some point during his fall. Todd’s mind races, tearing into itself because he’s just dropped his bleeding and drugged and worryingly vulnerable friend down a staircase and now _Dirk isn’t moving_.

Then, after what feels like eternity, Dirk groans loudly, and time restarts and Todd shakily takes the remaining steps two at a time, his heart stuttering wildly in his chest. Thoughts of the worst run through his mind, but by the time he’s made it to the bottom, Dirk is already trying to push himself upright on limp, noodley arms. He seems entirely unfazed by his tumble.

“I was flying, Todd,” he slurs in awe, as his glassy eyes blearily on Todd’s form squatting beside him. Todd almost laughs with relief.

“I think falling might be a better term for it,” he mutters, taking hold of Dirk’s upper arms and helping him to sit. He ends up against the bottom step of the stairs with his legs twisted oddly beneath him, but he doesn’t seem to care about the awkward position.

“Nooo, Todd, flying! Definitely flying, I’m Icarus, of course I can fly! I’m-” Dirk breaks off, looking excited and then giggles at something only known to him. Todd shushes him, but only makes him giggle more until, really quite suddenly, his laughing stops and his expression droops. He looks almost pensive. Then he looks up at Todd. His gaze is steadier than before.

“I feel sick,” he reports, matter-of-factly, his eyebrows knitting together.

Todd frowns.

“Did you bump your head?” he asks, concerned, and Dirk shrugs slowly in response, his uncoordinated arms spreading theatrically until his hands hit the banisters on either side of the stairs.

Todd sighs in frustration. Dirk giggles again.

“I hate you when you’re high,” he mutters, and then reaches up to run his hands over Dirk’s head, feeling for bumps for the second time in less than ten minutes. Dirk leans away from his touch, falling back against the bottom step of the stairs.

“You can’t hate me, you’re my best assis-firend!” he whines, sounding suddenly anxious, and when Todd looks down, he finds his expression has crumpled. He looks about to cry. “You don’t really hate me, do you?”

Todd runs a hand over his head. “No, of course not.”

Dirk pouts and rubs at his watery, wide eyes.

“But you said you did?” he whines quietly, eyes bleary and scared and anxious and worryingly watery. Todd takes his hand and gives it a squeeze.

“I know, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t hate you, okay?”

Dirk seems to consider what has been said, and then nods and sighs and flops to the side, his head landing against the banister with a clonk. He reaches up to rub at the spot.

“I'm tired, Todd,” he mutters, looking up with weary eyes. Todd smiles gently.

“Come on, lets go home.”

Dirk sniffles, then nods, and allows himself to be helped to his feet.

It takes Todd a few steps to realise Dirk is limping and his stomach twinges guiltily.

* * *

Dirk wakes with what feels like an out of tune marching band residing inside his head. There’s a roiling sort of unsettledness playing in his stomach, and an achy, shaky feeling in his muscles, and when he opens his eyes, the sunlight creeping around his curtains burns against his retinas.

Instinctively he rolls away, fighting down a groan as his aching muscles protest the movement, and throws a hand over his face against the light. The hand is rough against his face, fabric in the place of expected skin, and when he squints open his eyes to investigate, he finds it neatly bandaged from knuckles down past his wrist in a way that adds up with the vague memory he finds of hands grasping his and the burn of a needle as it was roughly pushed into a vein.

He doesn’t remember anything after that, remembers little of what happened before it either, just a house and a gang of men and a whirring blue and red machine and a drug that didn’t work quite as it was meant to, but his head is throbbing much too much for him to want to push himself to find those missing memories.

He decides it doesn’t really matter either, because just visible past the glass of water on his previously cluttered bedside table and dozing in a chair he’s dragged through from the lounge, is Todd. 

Todd who he knows came to get him even though he can’t remember it, who got him home and bandaged and into bed, who has spent the night beside his bed just to make sure he was okay, who has left painkillers and water on his bedside table to fight the drug hangover he was sure to get.

And even though Dirk doesn’t know for sure what happened the day before, doesn’t remember why he went where he went or what was going on there or why his knee is throbbing below the sheets, he knows that it doesn’t really matter because he has Todd, Todd who stepped in and saved him just like he always does.


End file.
